William Harvey

William Harvey (1 April 1578-3 June 1657) was an English physician who was known for his major contributions to anatomy and physiology. The oldest of nine children, he attended the University of Cambridge at the age of 15 before studying at Padua at age 21. He took medical and anatomy courses under Hieronymus Fabricius, who taught him that dissection offered a route to better understanding of the human body. Harvey would become the first scientist to describe blood circulation, ignoring textbooks and explaining how veins and arteries form a complete circuit in the human body. His work De Moto Cordis (1628) described the function of the heart and the concept of blood circulation, ideas that he had explored when he cut animals open. Therefore, he deduced that the heart was actually a pump.